Israelis skeptical about Obama spurring peace
(Israel Hayom/Exclusive to JNS.org) Sixty-two percent of Jewish Israelis say they do not believe that U.S. President Barack Obama can bring about a real breakthrough in Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations, according to a poll released by the Israel Democracy Institute on Tuesday.
After pollsters divided participants by Israeli political party, the survey revealed that Labor members were the most optimistic concerning the U.S. president’s peace-building capacity, with 74 percent supporting Obama’s abilities. Following Labor was Hatnuah (67 percent), Kadima (67 percent) and Meretz (50 percent), all left-leaning or centrist parties. Only 22 percent of the Habayit Hayehudi party backed Obama’s peace-making potential, and only 12 percent of Shas members shared the sentiment.
Jewish Israelis are divided almost evenly with regards to whether Israel ought to show more flexibility to help Obama get negotiations with the Palestinians restarted. Around 50 percent said they believed Israel should show more flexibility, while 48 percent said Jerusalem should remain steadfast and make no concessions.
A small majority of Jewish Israelis (51 percent) said they believed Obama carried a neutral, business-like attitude towards the Jewish state, while 36 percent believed he was friendly and 11 percent believed him to be hostile toward Israel. More Jewish Israelis thought Obama was pro-Palestinian (23 percent) than pro-Israel (18 percent).
Passover Haggadah used by Jews serving in Iran in WWII makes its way to Israel
(JNS.org) Israeli Aviram Paz recently came across two rare versions of the Passover Haggadah, including one used by Jews serving in Iran during World War II. Paz, 60, has been amassing a collection of 8,000 Passover Haggadot for years and storing them in a secure climate-controlled room at his home in Kibbutz Mishmar Haemek.
One Passover Haggadah found by Paz was made by Jewish soldiers who served in the British military during World War II and were stationed in Iran from 1942 to 1945.
“We’re talking about dozens of fighters who called themselves ‘Jewish soldiers in Babylonian exile,’” said the 60-year-old Paz, according to Israel Hayom. “They were involved in defending oil facilities and refineries in the city of Abadan from possible attacks by the German and Japanese militaries.”
The soldiers used simple paper pages to make this Passover Haggadah, copies of which were printed using a typewriter. The covers were made from cardboard used by British police to pack equipment.
Paz said the Passover Haggadah in his possession is the only one made by the soldiers that still exists in the world.
“By the way, these soldiers also established a newspaper called Einav, with an opinion section called ‘On the Rivers of Babylon,’” Paz said.
Another Passover Haggadah that Paz was able to get his hands on was one used by soldiers from the Givati Brigade’s legendary reconnaissance company. The Passover Haggadah was made by soldiers in 1954 and contains simple stencil pages. Throughout the Haggadah, there are illustrations and symbols, including the famed insignia of the Givati Brigade at the time with cactuses and a sword.
“This is a Haggadah with the style of the Palmach and the kibbutzim,” Paz said. “In it, there are illustrations of tools used by the Israel Defense Forces in those days, mainly the jeeps of Samson’s Foxes (a commando unit during the 1948 War of Independence) and many words of exaltation.”
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NYT magazine draws heat for cover story on Palestinian village known for protests
(JNS.org) A New York Times Magazine cover story is under fire from critics in the pro-Israel community who say it too sympathetically depicts a Palestinian village known for holding weekly demonstrations against Israel.
The story titled “Is this where the third Intifada will start?” about the West Bank village of Nabi Saleh was written by Ben Ehrenreich, who in 2009 penned an opinion piece for the Los Angeles Times headlined “Zionism is the problem.”
“In December 2009 they held their first march, protesting not just the loss of the spring but also the entire complex system of control—of permits, checkpoints, walls, prisons—through which Israel maintains its hold on the region,” Ehrenreich writes of Nabi Saleh’s residents for the New York Times. “Nabi Saleh quickly became the most spirited of the dozen or so West Bank villages that hold weekly demonstrations against the Israeli occupation.”
But Nabi Saleh was also the home of Ahlam Tamimi, a Palestinian woman who in August 2001 transported both the bomb and the bomber to the Sbarro pizza restaurant in downtown Jerusalem in an attack that killed 15 civilians, including seven children (Tamimi was sentenced to 16 life terms, but was one of the 1,027 Palestinians prisoners freed in the Gilad Shalit deal). Arnold Roth—father of Malki, a 15-year-old girl who died in the Sbarro attack—wrote in a blog entry that Malki “was the kind of young woman whose life and achievements ought to have entitled her to at least a fraction of the media coverage bestowed by the NYT editors and others on the murderer.”
The Nabi Saleh story says Tamimi remains “much-loved” in the village. But Roth noted on his blog, “A convicted felon and a mass-murderer convicted on multiple homicide charges, she has never denied the role she embraced and justifies it fully.”
Haaretz columnist Chemi Shalev called the Nabi Saleh story a “pro-Palestinian manifesto.” Seth Mandel of Commentary magazine pointed out what he considered to be the inflammatory nature of the story’s headline, “Is this where the third Intifada will start?”
“Note the word ‘will,’” Mandel wrote. “There will be blood, says the Times; who will get the glory? Incitement is the only theme of the piece.”
New York Times spokeswoman Eileen Murphy defended the story, telling the Washington Free Beacon, “Sunday’s magazine story was intended to provide a close-in look at one particular perspective in the Mideast conflict and we think it did so thoughtfully and sensitively.”
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Obama to highlight plight of Mideast Christians on visit
(JNS.org) U.S. President Barack Obama intends to highlight the plight of Middle East Christians during his upcoming trip to the region.
“It’s been a very difficult series of challenges for Christian communities in the region,” White House Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategic Communication Ben Rhodes said in a conference call with reporters ahead of the Obama Middle East trip, the Times of Israel reported.
These challenges were “not just in the West Bank, but [also in] places like Syria, Egypt and Iraq,” and “recognizing the very deep and ancient Christian communities in that part of the world is a very important thing to do,” Rhodes said.
Ancient Christian communities in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere have come under duress due to the Arab Spring revolutions and growing threat of Islamic extremism. Hundreds of thousands of Christians have fled their homes as a result.
Palestinians in the birthplace of Jesus, however, may not be greeting Obama with cheers. Palestinian protestors in Bethlehem on Monday set fire to pictures of President Obama and threw shoes at U.S. diplomatic vehicles near Manger Square ahead of his visit, the Jerusalem Post reported.
“We won’t receive Obama with flowers and a red carpet,” a protestor in Bethlehem declared. “We will receive him with shoes. We want to tell America that we hate you and you have no place here. We don’t want to see Obama in Palestine. He is coming to save Israel. He does not have anything to offer our people.”
During his trip to the Middle East, Obama is scheduled to meet with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Bethlehem, and they will tour the Church of Nativity together. Historically a Christian-dominated city, Bethlehem has seen its Christian population decline to just a third of the town’s residents, down from 75 percent only a few decades ago.
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Netanyahu: Security is top priority in new government
(JNS.org) Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking Monday at a ceremony introducing his new government, said that Israel’s security is his top priority in the new term.
“As prime minister, I don’t have the privilege to abandon the external challenges to Israel. We must ensure the existence of the State of Israel. Therefore, the first priority will be the defense of the country and its citizens,” Netanyahu said, the Jerusalem Post reported.
Netanyahu labeled the growing threat of Iran and its nuclear program as well as the deteriorating situation in Syria as Israel’s biggest security threats.
Netanyahu also discussed peace with the Palestinians. Netanyahu stated that his government would be ready to make a “historic compromise” with the Palestinians.
“We extend our hand in peace to the Palestinians,” Netanyahu said, the Associated Press reported. “Israel has proven time and again it is ready for concessions in exchange for real peace, and the situation today is no different.”
Netanyahu heads a 68-member center-right coalition, composed of Likud-Beytenu, Yesh Atid, HaBayit HaYehudi and Hatnua.
As Netanyahu begins his third term as Israeli prime minister, only Israel’s founding father, David Ben-Gurion, has served longer as prime minister.
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Preceding provided by JNS.org